I stroke the cat’s fur to hear her purr.
I love that sound, that and rain and train,
the water rush of wind in trees
their leaves rustling in relief,
brooks babbling, creeks bubbling,
rivulets running, streams sighing,
children playing, laughing,
lovers murmuring, friend’s hello,
wife’s I love you with bonus hug,
distant drone of airplane and buzz of fly
on hot summer day while lying in high grass,
church bell and Buddhist temple gong,
Westminster clock chime,
gospel and doo-wop harmony,
the drone of an old car on an older road,
bee buzz, surf slap,
me and you, baby coo,
bird chirp, cow moo,
your basic please and thank you,
most of Miles Davis,
and the silence of morning dew.

– Smith 1.30.2014

When you’re writing and posting a poem a day for four months, you take what you can get. I blog a lot I find less than fine, but they’re redeemed by the occasional wow I wouldn’t have written otherwise. I find many of the minor are liked by others while some I think zingers are ignored. Go figure, as Mr Vonnegut repeatedly said. The saving grace is the rewrite down the lane.

And I tell ya, writing a poem in an hour or so and then immediately posting it takes guts, arrogance, or a serious lapse of logic.

Naughty children mistaken for Buddha
run in the streets, play in the night.

Purple prairie clover covering even
song of the country’s uneven plight.

We walk down the streets pretending the cracks
don’t wear down our souls, lessening light.

So much to fix to make it move better,
knowing we could means that we might.

And if not, well the darkness gets darker
slowing the going, beckoning blight.

— Smith, 1.29.2014

Well that’s poem 121 written and posted in 121 days. Don’t know how long this can continue as I stumblebum on, but I’m grateful for the fun. A lot of so-so poems in the batch, but some amazing ones as well.

original Yesterday and Today Beatles album cover, 1966

The foto above is my original cover of the Beatles’ 1966 Yesterday and Today album. They printed 750,000 copies of the butcher meat cover and reaction was so negative they recalled them and destroyed most of them, but to save money, tens of thousands had an innocuous white trunk cover (foto below) slapped over the offending cover and were shipped back out.

I was near the end of my first year at the Naval Academy and shoplifted the trunk cover album from the Midshipman’s store. I tired of it and traded it away, then a year later traded it back. One night drunk in my room I noticed the dark blotch of Ringo’s head semi-showing through the white so moistened my finger and started rubbing the cover cover off. Eventually I cut it down to fit my collaged Pockets journal, which lessens the value but if I hadn’t, I would have lost it along the way after I was kicked out in 1968 for smoking grass and moved to Baltimore then Michigan, Arizona, Ohio, England, Netherlands, Poland, Croatia, France, Spain, Morocco, Mexico, and finally back to Cleveland Ohio over the next 41 years..

I don’t know what he’s going to play
he doesn’t know what I’m going to say
(I don’t know what I’m going to say)
but we cut in one take
he adds bass and frills to thrill fill
I add mocking voices
he runs it thru mix mill
emails me home
where I post it
say so long go on to
next poem
next song
next toke
next lyric
next fart
next art.
But if you want today’s slow jam
go to ReverbNation.com/MutantSmith
and click Farm-a-sutra
it is what it is
whatever that am
(music mix recording Peter Ball
word voice me)

This is Blind Money Davis comin’ atcha,
seize ya on the downsize next crime.

— Smith, 1.28.2014

The following song is what it is, whatever that is . . . maybe a slow walking talking blues with extended glitches, recorded two hours ago. Click here to hear Farm-a-Sutra.

Here are the lyrics since my words compete with my mush mouth.

Farm-a-Sutra

Oh Little Girl Blue come blow my horn,
my sheep has left and I’m so forlorn.
Besides I’m allergic to its wool
and its baa-ing made me feel the fool.

Chicken’s nice but its feathers tickle,
the mice too small and way too fickle.
The geese bite and the pig’s too dirty,
though the cow’s cool, its eyes all flirty.

Girl blue deleted you
So guess no one will expedite you
Oh come expedite-delete my horn
Flock’s fled and I’m ex-delete forlorn

The horses don’t like horsing around,
and the moles won’t come from underground.
My best friend dog prefers neighbor’s cat
while the cat doesn’t know where it’s at.

The snakes are too fast and the frogs too wet,
the fish in the pond won’t answer yet.
I even tried it with soft warm mud
but broke my stick, bent my bud.

Girl blue expletive-deleted you
So guess no one will expedite you too
Oh come expletive-delete my horn
Flock’s fled and I’m ex-delete forlorn

The farmer’s daughter way down the lane
tried it once but she won’t do it again.
So Little Girl Blue it’s up to you,
otherwise I don’t know what to do.

The gears I muster, the traction I make, the tending andlearning and gathering and hunkering.

Arraying myself, making array from disarray. Using
disarray to hatch, mulch, compost. Gathering disarray
like humus collected from trees, normal dropping of twigs
over a season, work to do.

That which relates to nature relates to my life,
that which I do can be more in the general flow of nature–
even technical bits can be more harmonious, a good part
of nature. Like sweeping, a broom, winding garlic garlands,
canning the excess of a season to put in my keep,
my laden cupboards, my nest.

Satisfaction of opening that which I’ve cultivated, that which
I’ve gathered, the bunching I crunched to make
harvest season.

How it goes so fast; two months ago I boiled the kitchen,
steam on the windows, sticky on the floor, stayed up late
past bedtime, crunched to do what I’d done.

I remember the physicality of it, 60 days ago, 1400 hours
and now I’m turning screw threads on jars, being a bit sparing
so as to savor and dole, steam poured into winter.

So glad for the abundance our civilization’s put aside, the
abstraction of money such that specialists flourish, like
granularity of so many kinds of pollen.

How I can drive to stores any time, really, stores,
community pantries, and there’s lots set aside, more
than enough for anyone, really, and we’ll have Spring.

Table talking sewing,
marching meditation,
unburdening Buddha,
altar apples, oranges, lemons,
through the birthday chocolate pound cake
with the scandal of the candles,
the perp wearing sandals as we handle the vandal,
(say, how much is that doggie in the poundcake?).

Walking warm air purple petal street
in Marrakech dusk
beneath red flower trees
and black hash stone,
an open carriage with four white horses
and brown Berber driver trots past,
its four coach Caucasians pointing,
surprised to see us alone,
hand-in-hand and white
in unwhite part of town.